Thug jailed after breaking man’s jaw in Ilkeston Market Place attack

A man has been jailed after a street attack in Ilkeston left his victim with a broken jaw in two places.

The injured man had to have surgery to fit metal plates in his jaw, and has been left unable to eat solids.

Connor Sowersby, 21, of no fixed address, admitting wounding the man in Ilkeston Market Place on November 10 this year.

Prosecutor Robby Singh told Nottingham Crown Court the victim went outside the Market pub for a cigarette when he saw Sowersby, a man he had known for some time. A comment was made by one of the group he was with about the victim, then violence flared.

Another man headbutted him. Sowersby punched and kicked him. The injured man managed to get away to a pub to clean himself up. But he saw Sowersby again when he left. The defendant punched him once in the street, knocking him to the floor. The man went to hospital and was found to have two complex jaw fractures to the left and right side of his lower jaw. His victim impact statement said the event had knocked his confidence and ‘he feels like staying at home in the dark’.

Judge James Sampson sent him to prison for two years and four months after he pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm.

The judge said: “This was sustained violence. You used your shod foot as a weapon.

“Even now your victim is not eating solids, is in pain, and his confidence about going out is severely dented.”

Barrister Sonal Ahya, mitigating, said her client was right when he said to officers that he ‘needed to sort himself out’.